Pakistani minister puts bounty on anti-Islam filmmaker's head

By DECLAN WALSH

September 23, 2012 — 11.52am

ISLAMABAD — A Pakistani Cabinet minister has offered a US$100,000 reward for the death of the person behind the anti-Islam video made in the United States that has roiled Muslims around the world, even suggesting that Taliban and al-Qaeda militants could carry out the killing.

Railways Minister Ghulam Ahmad Balor said at a news conference in Peshawar that he would personally finance a bounty aimed at the maker of the crude, low-budget video that denigrates the Prophet Muhammad.

Mr Balor acknowledged that incitement to murder was illegal but said he was "ready to be hanged in the name of the Prophet Muhammad." And he invited the Taliban and al-Qaeda to be "partners in this noble deed," according to news reports.

The incendiary statements came a day after violent protests paralysed Pakistan's largest cities, leaving 23 people dead and more than 200 injured, and invited fresh criticism of the government's handling of the crisis.

A senior aide to Mr Balor sought to qualify his statements, saying that their purpose was to channel frustration and anger away from the streets of Pakistan and toward the filmmaker in the United States.

But in Islamabad, the government distanced itself from the comments.

"We completely dissociate ourselves from the statement of Mr Balor," Shafqat Jalil, press secretary to Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf, said in an interview after several hours of silence from the government.

Mr Jalil added that the prime minister had been trying contact the leader of Mr Balor's party, a minority member of the coalition government. "The PM will try to work something out with him" he said.

Protest rally ... a young Pakistani woman, her face adorned with the words "Life 4 Holy Prophet Mohammed" takes part in a demonstration in Islamabad on Saturday.Credit:AFP

An Obama administration official ? said he did not want to comment until he knew more about the context of the comments.

The bounty offer came during widespread criticism of the government, which declared a public holiday Friday to facilitate what it hoped would be peaceful protests, calling it a "Day of Love for the Prophet Muhammad."

"Pakistan was truly leaderless on Friday," said Maleeha Lodhi, a former ambassador to the United States. "By ceding space to the mob, the government actually joined the mob. These statements only reinforce how playing to the gallery has very dangerous, long-term consequences for the country."

Mr Balor did not name the target of his bounty, but it was widely presumed to be Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, 55, who lives in California and has been linked to the 14-minute video, described as a trailer for a movie named Innocence of Muslims.

Nakoula has not confirmed reports of his involvement, but he has been questioned by police near his residence south of Los Angeles. In Pakistan, Mr Balor's offer was taken more as a piece of political grandstanding than a serious threat. A day earlier, at least six people died during protests in Peshawar, and rioters destroyed property that included a cinema belonging to Mr Balor's brother, Aziz.

"It is not for us to destroy our country and our own poor people. That's why he said this," said Mr Balor's aide, Zulfikar Ahmed, explaining the rationale for the bounty.

Yet Mr Balor's party has suffered many attacks at the hands of the Taliban, which has killed dozens of his party members in recent years.

Pakistan Railways, the state-owned company Mr Balor presides over, is deep in debt and its performance has been marked by frequent strikes, poor service and train crashes — a fact to which some irate Pakistanis referred in comments on social media after the reward was announced.

"Mr Balor would better serve the Prophet Muhammad by saving the railways," said a person using the name Tariq Ahsan on Twitter.

Protests continued in other parts of the subcontinent. In Bangladesh, clashes between Islamist groups and the police left more than 100 people wounded after the protesters tried to march through the capital, Dhaka, in defiance of a ban on demonstrations that has been in force since Friday afternoon.

In Pakistan, a group of Christians in the northwestern city of Mardan said they would hold their Sunday service on the road to protest the destruction of their church during Friday's riots.